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Light shed on mystery Beirut dig

A few days ago, investigative journalist Habib Battah posted a report on his (excellent) blog, describing a nosy around one of the many fenced-off plots in central Beirut. Click the link to have a quick read, first, if you haven’t already.

Since I read that, I’ve also been asking around, and have come up with the following, from a source I trust – an archaeological expert who wants to remain anonymous.

This person says the Wadi Abu Jamil area was – as Battah suggested – Beirut’s hippodrome in Roman times. It is currently being excavated by Hans Curvers, a Dutch archaeological consultant. Curvers has published papers on Beirut’s hippodrome here, and was interviewed by the Beirut Daily Star in 2011 on exactly this subject.

My source continues that the site photographed by Battah is closed off because work is currently being done there by a Marburg University team led by Professor Winfried Held. There’s a ceramics expert examining material from what is thought may be a theatre (perhaps predating the Roman era), alongside an architect, a photographer and a draftsperson. It is described as a “post-excavation research deal”, initially running for three years, perhaps to be extended thereafter. There is, I’m told, very little of the hippodrome architecture left, hence the requirement for a multi-specialist team to help the excavator figure it out. “Very sensible,” my source remarks.

A person closely connected with historical and archaeological research in Lebanon (sorry about all this anonymity) tells me: “We should be pleased that the site is now well-guarded. The original site in 1994 was used as a public toilet until Solidere put a fence around the entire Beirut Souks site. All has certainly not been destroyed by the building companies, and we should be wary of false bad publicity.”

I’m also told that Solidere has fifty large-scale, multilingual public noticeboards, printed (somehow?) on stone, ready to go up in the BCD explaining the history and archaeology of downtown Beirut.

It’s perhaps understandable that historians and archaeologists with an interest in Beirut resist criticism of Solidere – after all, work, funding and, perhaps, career prospects depend on maintaining good relations with the company. It’s also regrettably clear why nobody wants to put their name to any remarks, even positive ones.

Not everything Solidere does is bad.

But then again, I’d argue Beirut is clearly worse off for Solidere and what it has done over the last 20 years. A previous post by Battah, critical of Solidere, sparked much debate about the company. Prominent blogger Mustapha Hamoui gave this trenchant response, unnecessarily shielding, it seems to me, an opaque, grossly over-resourced, excessively powerful, profit-driven entity that has emasculated the BCD, simply because it’s not the only thing that’s bad about Beirut. True, it’s not. But, let’s face it, Solidere is a mighty big thing that’s mightily bad.

That said, though, with the impossibility of rooting the company out, I’d rather that it fenced off areas of historical interest to allow the archaeologists to work than, as has happened far too much already in Beirut, blithely bulldozes them for redevelopment.

The problem comes with, in Lama Bashour’s words, “this new photo fascism in Lebanon, where anyone with half an ounce of power orders you to stop taking photographs in public spaces.” That, perhaps, is the most telling takeaway from Habib Battah’s original, fascinating post.

4 Comments

Habib

Great stuff, thank you Matt. I’ve always hoped Solidere will surprise us one day and launch museums and installations, perhaps showcasing so much that was destroyed during the rebuilding–even some of the building materials, such as these glass sidewalks, which may have been widespread throughout the city and tell a story about its lost architectural styles: http://www.beirutreport.com/2013/03/glass-sidewalks-from-nyc-to-beirut.html

But one must wonder, if all these panels are ready, what is taking so long? It’s been 20 years and so far the lion’s share of Solidere’s work has focused on selling and demolishing and erecting as many private or quasi private structures as possible– spaces that feel more designed to keep ‘low class’ people out than to draw the general public in. Non-profit initiatives seem to be almost if not completely non-existent at this stage.

Thanks, Habib – great to hear from you. From what I’ve been told the panels aren’t going up because of political uncertainty in Beirut surrounding the Syria issue. Yep, that sounded odd to me, too. You’re better placed than I am to find out more… 🙂

And Louise, yes, I agree. Though I do remember having conversations back in 1994/5 with Lady Sursock and people at APSAD, as well as others around Beirut, who were deeply concerned at Solidere’s plans even then.